SEO at University

[veget]

Hi everybody,
As the Search Industry grows, also grows the number of courses related to it. I´m from Brazil and this subject is really recent over here, so we don´t have many courses and degrees that handle with SEO. I´m currently studying advertising at college (I graduate this year) and I would like to make a specialization in Search Marketing. I´m seeking for courses in Europe and US. At this moment I have found a really nice Master Degree at New York University, called Integrated Marketing (offline marketing also interests me). Their curriculum seems to be really good and up to date (check http://www.scps.nyu.edu/areas-of-study/marketing/graduate-programs/ms-integrated-marketing/degree-requirements.html).
I would like to know if you have any course/master degree recommendation.

Thanks for your attention,
Maurício Bastos

[AussieWebmaster]

There will be more schools offering courses covering this soon

[veget]

but do u know NYU? is it worth?

[AussieWebmaster]

the advanced marketing course seems to suggest they will cover seo etc.... have to ask around about it... who is teaching it etc.

[cryptblade]

I actually saw this program about... 3 years ago. Considered applying for it because I was really interested. Back then it was Interactive Marketing, not Integrated Marketing.

But, it was a Masters, not a MBA - so, not sure how relevant it will be as relates to business.

NYU, in general, is a good school. NYU Business is Stern - one of the top business schools in the US. Up there with Wharton, Harvard, Kellogg, Tucker, etc.

In all honesty, though, I dont see that as important for a job in the search industry. From my experience and from recruiters, a lot of companies value experience. It really is one of those kinds of jobs where, it's so new, that you have to have experience to be qualified. It's not like engineering where you must have a PE to work any decent engineering jobs.

I've seen a lot of recruiters hiring for PPC managers. On the SEO front, PHP developers who know or are aware of SEO are valuable.

Other than that, they like marketing people who know how to read and analyze data from analytics software. Curiously, a lot still talk about Hitbox, Omniture, etc - but most companies using those software are decent and profitable companies. Many more small sites use Google Analytics - free and plenty good as those others.

I went to school at Carnegie Mellon and back in ... 2000-2001, they had a course on Internet Marketing. And I remember walking away with only 1 knowledge - that cookies, through Bayesian statistical analysis, you can build a demographic profile of the user.... not that useful actually. And nowhere were search engines mentioned.

*shrugs*

[NewKidOnTheBlock]

I think college degrees will never become as important as they are in other fields, because in SEO results/skill can be quantified SO easily (if you know a bit about SEO and don't get tricked by the I rank #1 for a keyword without competition thing..).

I think this is very similar to sales as opposed to other jobs in business: The hierarchy is flatter in sales than in business in general..you just can quantify the skill so easily. If somebody makes a ton of sales chances are he's good at what he's doing - no matter how many PhD's he got (I stole that last bit from a copywriting book I once read ;)).

After all companies don't know anything to universities and if you're a business owner and can quantify skill by looking at raw numbers (sales profits, rankings) why think too much about degrees...that was actually one of the reasons why I found SEO so appealing when I got interested in it (that you can quantify the skill and have better chances to advance faster than on your average job)!

EDIT: oh and I think for SEO college degrees could actually be kind of detrimental. An SEO needs to be a self-starter...so if you were taught how to do SEO with college classes instead of having to read up and find all the information and learn to seperate the good stuff from the bad information, etc.

[cryptblade]

EDIT: oh and I think for SEO college degrees could actually be kind of detrimental. An SEO needs to be a self-starter...so if you were taught how to do SEO with college classes instead of having to read up and find all the information and learn to seperate the good stuff from the bad information, etc.

I'll disagree with you on that one. I would not say "detrimental". I mean, seriously, if an SEO came with a BS in CS from Carnegie Mellon University (yes, shout out to my alma mater), and knew PHP programming AND SEO, then how can that be detrimental?

On the other hand, if you were speaking on a hypothetical "SEO" degree, then yeah, maybe it won't be so useful. But that also depends on who's buying.

For me, I get a lot of recruiters who call me with "opportunities" for SEM or SEO or PPC. It seems corporate HR can't do the recruiting themselves. And recruiters have no clue either. Some are slowly getting it more - but recruiters are nothing more than sales people too.

But, I think a fundamental college degree is necessary. Depending on your role, a degree in marketing or CS or IT or IS - something that teaches database programming - that would be beneficial as a foundation.

But then again - any one of us out of school and in the working world should know by experience by now - aint nothing we learned in school really applied directly to work. But school taught us a foundation of how to think, problem solve, basic skills that grew into work skills, etc.

[NewKidOnTheBlock]

I mean, seriously, if an SEO came with a BS in CS from Carnegie Mellon University (yes, shout out to my alma mater), and knew PHP programming AND SEO, then how can that be detrimental?


Yeah, I guess you're right about that. I just realized that if it was kind of like a computer science degree (which I know is extremely difficult to obtain (at least in Germany?) and requires a lot of outside-the-classroom work, too!) those guys probably wouldn't have a problem keeping up with the changes in SEO.

I guess I was biased, because I'm majoring in business(?) thinking of SEO as a specialization class in a business degree. Or an SEO degree with more of a marketing background.

I'm just realizing that SEO is a great field for me, because I've always taught things to myself (I taught myself English and French, taught myself programming small computer games in elementary, etc.) and think that's the kind of mindset you need to have to be an SEO, whereas most people I know (many of whom are better than I am at college/school) are so used to being told exactly what to do and study exactly this material for that test, etc. - a friend of mine is about to graduate with a B+ from an engineering degree, but felt overwhelmed with his thesis telling me: "my gosh, in school I never really learned to think on my own..I always just got the material did as I was told...and now I'm supposed to get this done all by myself?" - which made me realize that people in this field are often successful because of being self-starters (which most people in university (or in general) are not).

but then again having a degree in general would of course not be detrimental, I was just thinking about how it might attract the wrong kind of person to the job? or something?lol ...but if I think about a friend who's majoring in computer science for example I know they have to learn a ton of stuff (programming languages, etc.) during the semester break and on their own, too...

not sure about my own point anymore! LOL

[cryptblade]

Here's the issue with SEO. It is still a "mess". An SEO "guru" does not necessarily know HOW to do everything - only know how to analyze, identify what to fix, etc. That kind of skill set requires a mixture of a lot of things - tech, marketing, business, etc.

You can't group SEO into marketing, you can't group it into IT or web design or web development. It's everything into 1 thing. Very strange brew.

My experience in the working world though, is that companies and recruiters are not very sophisticated when it comes to evaluating what talent they need.

Often, a company needs a "guru" or SEM/SEO manager who knows what to do; knows how to strategize, knows how to create action steps. A manager, however, does not necessarily know how to specifically do everything that he/she knows needs to be done.

For example, I know that dynamic URLs need to recoded to a search engine friendly URL. But I am not very good at PHP, don't know CFM, etc. But, as a manager, because I know what I lack - I know what I need. So I can evaluate a good PHP programmer- someone who can problem solve for me.

But some companies need someone with more technical SEO skills. I interviewed for a job a few years ago - and as they asked questions, I realized I had no idea what they were talking about. They were getting into technical details that were too beyond what I was comfortable with (my skills are in HTML and CSS for instance). So in this case, they wasted my time and their time - because they didn't know what they were looking for. I also once interviewed for a company looking for "SEO / IT" - confusing the two together.

IT people wont necessarily know SEO. A marketing person wont necessarily know database programming. You can find people with IT/DB programming backgrounds or marketing backgrounds, but they may not know enough or be aware enough of the other side of SEO. So a "guru" is the person who has all the awareness - and knows what talent is needed. That's knowledge that is critical. Any company can hire a cheaper marketer and programmer to do the dirty work as long as the SEM/SEO guru is in place.

Now, keeping this in mind - could you have a degree or concentration in SEO? Yes - so long as that is meant to be a managerial degree. Like an MBA (ok that might be a stretch...). But seriously - how many people have an MBA and enough business knowledge and background to be a CEO? Few. Most MBAs are experienced and learn "enough" to be managers. You could, conceivably, have a degree program in SEO and/or PPC (aw heck, SEM) to be prepared to be an in-house SEO/SEM manager. As some threads have already discussed, an in-house SEM manager can be someone who is the point person, the liaison between the company and an SEO/SEM provider - someone who knows what's going on and can evaluate and help the SEM provider to effectively work with the company.

You could also have the SEM Manager manager the SEM team - be it PPC, SEO, or PPC and SEO team. You might not need to know how to do it point for point, but know the overall strategy, what needs to be done, and effectively manage the individual SEO/PPC team members.

You will also rarely find the individual who can grasp marketing AND programming. SEO tech-wise requires someone who knows programming- particularly PHP, ASP, CFM, .Net - the technology that many websites are built from. SEO marketing-wise requires someone who can do competitive analysis, keyword research, strategic marketing, etc. These are not mutually inclusive skills.

But, again, a degree in HOW TO DO SEO is absurd. You can't teach SEO - impractical.

[beu]

Providing a bona-fide SEO degree program at major public Universities in the US is difficult because of $, curriculum and staff.

SEO touches CS, Marketing, Advertising, New Media, Design, Graphic Arts and more. CS often falls in the School of Engineering, Marketing and Advertising in the Business, New Media in Journalism and Design and Graphic Arts in the Art School. In the US, in most cases each schools/departments is in direct competition with all the rest for Grant money. Nobody is going to let someone else step on their toes so to speak. Don't kid yourself, college professors don't show up every day because they love to teach. It's all about the Benjamins!!!!!

Colleges and Universities have to select a curriculum, determine what books they will use, order books, figure out class topics, create a schedule, test and exam questions and so on before submitting to department heads and then Deans for approval... Let's say that process only takes six months. If the class is three months in duration all information on the final exam is 9 months old. Now consider, nine months or so ago it was ok for sites to buy and sell links passing PR. How would you answer that question if it was on your final exam?

How many SEOs do you know with a phd or mba? How many SEOs with a phd or mba are going to take a cut in pay to teach college classes, grade papers and not do SEO? If your undergrad and/or masters level professor has a four year degree why would you pay his University more money to go to grad school? Ummm... Larry and Sergey don't have phds! All these questions seem to ask, who can teach the class?

These issues alone are nearly impossible to overcome in a University setting. Innovation is the product of a flat management structure. The management structure of a University is anything but flat. "Search" is one of the only industries where you can be a leading expert, making well into 6 figures, not reporting to work on your couch until noon and in your boxer shorts all at age 25!:)

[NewKidOnTheBlock]

LOL I liked the last paragraph beu - that's exactly what I meant by SEO having a flat hierarchy (like sales, though it might not be as flat there?). If you can easily quantify somebody's level of skill by looking at numbers (rankings, sales) why would you care for a PhD or something? If I had to interview two SEOs or two salesmen and one of them had a bachelor's degree (or maybe no degree, at all) but had better rankings / clearly sold more stuff...I wouldn't care about degrees, but simply about their performance.

They were getting into technical details that were too beyond what I was comfortable with (my skills are in HTML and CSS for instance).

What kind of technical skills were that? To be honest I can't imagine what kind of technical skills they might have asked for? php and database programming? just curious!

[cryptblade]

Go 'dawgs eh Beu? Good point on how universities work. Not all schools are like that though. Case in point, my alma mater - Carnegie Mellon University. CMU has a program called HCI - Human Computer Interaction. It is a fusion of CS and (of all things) Philosophy. Sprinkled in with a bit of design.

...heck you can argue that Industrial design is design mixed in with psychology and marketing.

Lots of programs overlap. The degree of overlap is important. I would argue that SEO is Marketing & CS. Within marketing you learn advertising, marketing analysis, strategic marketing, marketing research etc. Within CS, understanding how computers process information, information relationship, information archiving/taxonomy, database programming (and.. CSS HTML... but not real programming), etc.

You could have a 5 year program for this kind of study - but then again, 5 years is an eternity for SEO - better learned on the job with basic marketing and CS skills.

On the other hand, I would argue that instead of an "SEO" degree, an degree in SEM Management or Interactive Marketing Management is feasible.

For this program, you would need the candidate to learn marketing and technology/programming so that he (no I will not use "she" PC be darned!) has a foundational understanding and awareness. He then needs to know how to analyze and how to research. He also needs to understand what metrics are important, how to relate that to business decisions and action steps, an ultimately, make recommendations.

This kind of program would actually be easy to create and implement because it would incorporate a lot of courses already taught for business degree and MBA programs. This program would prepare a person to be hired to be in charge of a company SEM program - and act as the manager, the main liaison between company and service provider, and help analyze results to make company business decisions. And this program would also make it flexible for the candidate to operate as SEO manager or PPC manager.

...you'd think CMU would have something like this back in 2001 - since they DID do a lot of work on the old pre-modern search engine known as Lycos....(but now I think Google has a lab with them and recruits their CS grads...)

[beu]

Not all schools are like that though. Case in point, my alma mater - Carnegie Mellon University.

So true, a course structure like CMU's isn't as easy to implement at larger institutions. Either way, a true advantage for CMU!

[john645]

Just wait a few more years, as economies move online more and more we will see a major increase in online marketing, and web development courses at most major Universities.

[cryptblade]

Looking at this topic again - and finding it irresistible to see if this is good program for me instead of a "general" MBA - it's clear NYU is on the cutting edge of pushing this program of "Interactive marketing" study.

http://www.scps.nyu.edu/areas-of-study/marketing/graduate-programs/ms-integrated-marketing/index.html

If you look at a lot of the details they published, they are definitely things that, if you are already in that corporate environment, you would be doing already.

Here's a snippet from NYU's website:
Students learn everything they need to know to succeed in a marketplace where customers have access to information 24/7, worldwide on the Web, including:

* How to manage brands across multiple channels with strategically consistent branding
* How to use the best practices of direct marketing—such as financial analysis and response metrics—for circulation, subscription, clubs, and catalogs
* How to apply best practices online—through searches, e-mail, blogging, video, e-commerce, and social networking
* How to apply best practices to multichannel marketing that combines retail, e-tail, mail, mobile, print, broadcast, and/or video
* How to plan and analyze marketing costs, response data, Return on Investment (ROI), and customer Life Time Value

Clearly, anyone already working in the "trenches" know of these things and know how to do them correctly.

Here's another snippet:
The Google Online Marketing Challenge, a global student competition, is part of the curriculum for the Spring 2008 Web Mining class.

* The class is competing against students from universities in 61 countries.
* Each student team receives $200 of free online advertising with Google AdWords to use in their development of an online marketing campaign for a local business.
* In this real-world project, each team must outline strategy, implement and manage its campaign, analyze results, and provide the business with recommendations for next steps in online marketing.
* The prize is a trip to Google headquarters in Mountain View, California and a meeting with the Google team that created AdWords.
* Competing in the Google Online Marketing Challenge gives our students a way to show their strength to Google and to apply what they have learned in the M.S. in Integrated Marketing program. We already have one alumnus at Google, in the London-based strategy team for EMEA (Europe, the Middle East, and Asia).

This is pretty interesting because anyone already doing this kind of work also knows what to do with Google AdWords.

There are other schools doing "integrated marketing" with Golden Gate University as the only one that mentions "e-commerce" and "internet marketing" as part of the curriculum:
http://www.ggu.edu/welcome/imc/inquiry.jsp

Other than that, the others from Emerson College, Loyola University, etc. are teaching "integrated marketing communications" and not necessarily relating it to search engines or interactive marketing.

NYU is definitely at the forefront, but it also seems to be very rudimentary - as if it was designed for those who have NOT had any exposure to interactive marketing.

This leads me to wonder if it's necessary to have a specialized program for SEO/interactive marketing at all. After all, if you were to study for an undergrad degree, wouldn't a business or CS degree be more valuable? An undergrad business degree with a track in marketing or interactive marketing (that is, a few specialized courses) would be enough to get a fresh college grad ready to work for a company. Or, an undergrad degree CS would prepare the fresh college grad to be a computer problem solver. Both would have a good in-road into an SEO or SEM position. The rest of their education will come from working in the trenches; learning what works, what doesn't work, etc.

For a grad degree, what would be the point? An MBA would only be useful to prepare the candidate for a management position. At that level, it requires strategy and delegating. Again, if you are working in the trenches, changes are you've already been doing that as well.

So I now wonder if other MBA tracks will be better. A financial track or international business track would prepare the SEO for better sales or advertising analysis or for international SEO, respectively.

I watch the UFC Ultimate Fighter show. These fighters come trained in jujitsu, wrestling, boxing, kick-boxing, muay thai, and some have a few other things. They know that each fighting technique adds to their overall roundness.

I think the development of a good Interactive marketing program needs to take the same shape. Ask where's the value and what learning best prepares you strategically? Then go from there since this industry requires both a business and a tech mind.